Agenda: The ad hoc History & Archives Committee Meeting 2001
Agenda for The ad hoc History and Archives Committee Meeting 2001 ----------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Welcome and introductions. (Chairman, Carl House) 2. Current projects. a) All-Americans & All-Stars b) Championship Meet Results (Mary Beth Windrath) c) Current USMS Records d) USMS Records Ever Set e) Current FINA Records (held by USMS swimmers) f) FINA Records Ever Set (by USMS swimmers) g) Olympians in USMS h) The Permanent SwimmerID i) Stories, History & Oral History j) Photographs k) Storing Paper Archives (ISHOF, catalogue) l) LMSC Resource People m) Evaluation (getting feedback from people we serve) 3. Principles by which archives will be maintained. 4. New Business. 5. Adjourn.
Our archives reside at SwimGold.org where they were placed when Dorothy Donnelly and Carl House began this work (1996). Every page in our archives website has at least two links to USMS.org, and there are a few links from USMS.org to SwimGold.org. That means there are about 20,000 links from SwimGold.org to USMS.org. There are probably fewer than a dozen links from USMS.org to our archives.
The biggest challenge facing us now is to arrive at a recommendation for the strategy for continued development of our archives. Some argue that it is just "content" and should be added to USMS.org. Others argue that it is a different kind of content from that which is in USMS.org with special needs. This question is complicated for several reasons and we need a thoughtful, sound plan for the future of our archives.
(1) Maintenance of our information is a big job. We are already at the maximum effort we can ask of currently active volunteers. Whatever we do should be efficient in how it uses our volunteer labor.
(2) Moving our archives to USMS.org could require a great deal of work, depending on how it is done.
(3) Our archives are managed with a particular approach which is very, very dependent on the permanent swimmer id. Administration of the permanent swimmer id is done on software that can run on the server currently in use by SwimGold (NT Server). It would have to be adapted to run on USMS.org (Unix). Continuing our current development work for USMS archives can be more easily done on NT Server where it already resides.
(4) There are tens of thousands of entries in major search engines whereby anyone in the world can type in one of our names and find information in our archives. Google, AltaVista, HotBot, Lycos and Yahoo do an especially good job of indexing our archives. The following search engines also index us, though not as deeply: FastSearch, GoTo, MSN, LookSmart and NorthernLight. If we eliminate the information from SwimGold all these links will fail and we will lose value we've created for our swimmers and for our organization in major search engines.
(5) "SwimGold" is a good name for our archives. USMS could acquire the name if it wished to do so to preserve all this presence in search engines and to control the name for our archives forever.
(6) Greater integration of our archives with USMS.org could be achieved in several ways without moving SwimGold from the server where it currently resides. We could provide better access from USMS.org to our archives. We could make our archive pages more similar in appearance to USMS.org pages.
(7) If we decide to move our archives to the Unix server where USMS.org resides, we could do several things to preserve our current strength. The name "SwimGold.org" could become subsidiary to USMS.org so that all of our archives could be equally available from either USMS.org or from SwimGold.org. A search on USMS.org would include all of our archives. We could also take steps to preserve our capability for managing our archives. More detail on this can be provided.
(8) If SwimGold remains the domain for our archives, should it have its own technical development path that is in some ways separate from USMS.org? What should its goals, tasks, and budget be?
(9) We may need to articulate a set of procedures, rules & standards, including backup so that our archives can never be lost.
(10) If USMS acquires SwimGold.org, how is its use determined? Should our committee control its use, or another committee?
GOALS AND OBJECTIVES FOR USMS ARCHIVES -------------------------------------- (all goals are "within available labor & funds")
(a) preserve existing information (b) gather additional info that is currently available (c) draw from people more info (harder to get) (d) provide for safekeeping so info will never be lost (e) make info broadly available (f) make info easily available (g) make sure info is consistent and interrelated (h) create catalogue of info (i) protect against misuse of info (j) participate in coherent & desired exposure of USMS as led by the Communications Committee (k) be responsive to wishes of USMS leadership (l) use people well, ensure people who help feel appreciated and well used.
